The next day, the group scattered, with only Sandra and Smolder sticking together. They all seemed to have something they wanted to do, and set off in pursuit of it. Garble didn't even bring up trying to scale the tower on his own.

An improvement, in the eyes of the others.

Spike hurried back to the guild, jogging with his staff held in both hands as he went.

"I almost didn't expect you to come back." Tabitha was already there, making idle swings of her heavy mace in preparation. "You're just a dragon full of surprises."

"I didn't ask for help just to quit." He took a fighting stance, green magic glowing around his edges with readiness. "Let's learn something."

"She is too damn lucky to have you," she spat in what could have been a compliment. "Now, I've seen your spirit."

Spike's stance faltered. "Yeah?"

"And I'm alright with it." She nodded softly. "Not my style, but we're not here to train me, are we?" She swung her mace towards him. "What did you learn as we fought?"

"You're really hard to hit." He waggled his staff at her. "I mean, not, like, at all. I can do that. But it bounces off half the time."

"Because you didn't learn." She let her mace drop to the ground, thudding heavily as she reached into her clothes and pulled out a sheaf of paper and offered it towards him. "Did she even tell you about this?"

Spike accepted the paper with a skeptical look, but began to read over it. "What?! Seriously?!" He staggered back, his staff clattering to the ground to join Tabitha's mace. "There's a list?!"

"Duh." Tabitha leaned forward, hands on her hips. "Every known class has their skills recorded, barring the new ones. You discovered a new one, didn't you? Congratulations on that." She leveled a pointing finger at him. "Speaking of that, I'm taking it. The least you can do for the training is to show me it."

He began to slap at the paper. "Hold on. All this time all the spells and where to get them were just… there?"

"Look, kid." She reached out, patting him on the shoulder. "This is how Sandra rolls. I tried standing up for her, I did, but she fell through. Quitting is the only game she's got down. When you're busy running away, why would you bother learning about this?" She waved at the list. "Back to you. You're not a quitter, right?"

"No!" He clutched the page all the firmer. "I want to learn these!" His eyes fell to the paper. "I think I have most of the ones you can just buy…"

"I'd wonder if you didn't." She reached for her mace, hefting it up, shield at the ready. "Some are on rare equipment you can’t find easily, but some you can only learn in a fight."

Spike blinked with confusion, but it dawned. "You'll show me? Great!" He snatched up his staff. "I'll show you mine if you show me yours."

"Phrasing," she chastised, entirely ignorant of the turn of phrase she had used just the day before. "Let's go."

Spike brandished his staff, for a moment before stopping. “Er… I’m showing you Life Transfusion, so...what target should I use?”

An eyebrow raised in inquisition. “Are you serious? You’ve got a target right here.”

Spike blinked. “You… is that alright?”

“You’ve been throwing spells at me for two days now!” Tabitha frowned. “Don’t tell me you’re holdin’ out on me now. Whatever is it is probably not going to do anything to me that a healing spell won’t fix, so get on with it.”

Spike held up his staff, holding it in two hands. “Life Transfusion!” He flicked it at Tabitha, the line of energy sending out and striking her, a little energy pulled away and back to him. Which did nothing because he wasn’t hurt, but it was clear by her wincing it accomplished something.

Tabitha shook her head and shoulders a little, and then started looking from right to left, not at any particular thing. She wiggled her jaw from right to left, clearly in thought. “Okay, again.”

Spike sent another beam of life transfusion, causing Tabitha to wince again, gritting her teeth, followed by more thinking. “Again.”

Another blast of greenish energy, Spike feeling the rush of energy entering but doing nothing into him. She grit her teeth once more, thinking again. “This is more of a… regular spell than something that you’d come up with in the middle of a fight, isn’t it?” She opened a pack, putting her mace away, pulling out… what appeared to be another mace, except instead of a flanged head it had a lumpy head and a round glowing orb.

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Spike tilted his head.

“What? You don’t think I had a magic weapon?” Tabitha said. “It’s not as good as my main one, but I swap it out for healing.” She shook her shield. “I ain’t givin’ this up though.” She held the scepter out, pointing it up like Spike did with his staff. “Life Transfusion!” She sent her own blue stream of magic onto Spike, who grit his own teeth at the rather strange feeling of his vitality being sucked out. It really felt like a reverse-heal, and once it was done he simply felt bad. Not hurt anywhere, but he was sore a little everywhere.

“Ha!” Tabitha said, holding up her scepter. “Got it in one. Nice.”

“Yeah that… was pretty quick,” Spike said.

Tabitha shrugged. “I could tell pretty quick it was an application of the magic diverting ability the class has, just instead of being used as a blast or added to a weapon strike, being used for a heal. It’s pretty clever, though. I don’t think I would have thought to combine it like that.”

Spike twitched his ear frill. “Magic diverting?”

Tabitha exhaled in an amused face. “I guess you wouldn’t know about that either. Divine Lords specialize in diverting magic. Normal builds use it to stop attacks from hitting themselves or their allies. The whole basis for the martyr build is to divert magic from attacks from your allies to you, and then divert that back to the enemies.”

"Oh!" Spike brightened at the explanation. "Yeah, that makes sense, sure." He twirled his staff, little flecks of greenish energy almost shedding from it as he mended the aches, returning to top form. "That's better, now you were going to show me something, right? Trade for a trade."

Tabitha suddenly jabbed him with a finger in the chest. "At least you get that. A favor for a favor, that's how adventurers go. It's not like we're mercenaries, but keeping the karma wheel turning is how you keep people honest." She grunted with obvious annoyance.

"You… want to talk about it?" He planted his staff and leaned against it, watching her face. "You sure seem to have a lot of pent up everything about that."

"We're not here to talk about that!" she almost screamed, though she lowered her voice quickly, quieting before her sentence was even done. "We're here to train. You asked for a trainer, I accepted that duty. I will not fail at what I set out to do."

"And I do appreciate it, really." He stood up, staff held firmly in two hands, each separated from the other along the length of the magic device. "But adventurers give and get. Just consider that an offer to give an ear."

"You are the strangest little dragon I ever met," she noted flatly before shaking her head. "At least you seem like an alright divine lord. Let's make you better." She pointed to a dummy and moved in front of it. "Hit it. I promise I will never touch you. I won't distract you. But you won't hit it. Blast it, slap it with your stick, whatever you got. I won't let you."

Spike got himself ready, licking his lip in concentration, and immediately sent the same attack he just sent several times just a moment ago.

The mote of green light, attached with it’s lines, sped at Tabitha, who brought her shield up, which struck it not head on, but on it’s side, and there was a glow on the shield as she easily bat it aside. Spike frowned. He pulled up his staff, starting to run around her, pelting her with his life blasts, which she bat aside with her shield one by one as she circled the target dummy between them.

He grit his teeth. She didn’t have to move as far as he did. He could get the upper ground, though! And he flapped his wings, taking up to the air. His armor was… actually surprisingly heavy. He hadn’t done a lot of flying in it. But it was good enough to get above her and start shooting.

She had to extend more to block the hits, but she was still able to. They seemed to do very little to her, neither exhausting nor hitting her shields hard. Spike grit his teeth. He summoned up the biggest blast he could. He had a plan, and was ready.

Letting it fly, he shot his biggest blast down at her, while he stopped flapping and dove down at her, his staff starting to glow with a smite.

She grit her teeth, and held up her shield, the first attack bat away, and brought up her scepter, which collided with the staff’s glowing smite. The staff was stopped in its tracks, and the magic of the smite was thrown to the side, the remnants of the magic blasting to the ground beside Tabitha, although at least some hit her armored legs.

“Alright, that’s good,” Tabitha said, stepping back, shaking her leg. “Can you figure out what I was doing.”

Spike thought, and looked at the ground around. Scorch marks from his magic littered the area. “You… were just deflecting my attacks, like you said divine lords do.”

“That’s right.” Tabitha nodded.

“Can you really just… deflect everything? Be completely invulnerable?”

“Ah well,” Tabitha kinda looked sheepish. “No. Actually defending with this technique is all dependent on your skill at using it. But, well,” she smiled a smug smile. “I also have been teaching you for two days, and I was pretty confident you wouldn’t be able to overwhelm me. That last one had me struggling. BUT!” She stepped away from the dummy, swinging her scepter. “Whether or not you can beat it is not really the point. The point was can you do it?”

Spike released the staff with his left hand, his shield springing into being. "I was always trying to put it right between…"

"But you are a deflector," she reminded with a wagging finger.

"And I need to deflect," continued Spike, seeming to get it. "Yeah! Taking it dead on is doing it all wrong. Make it… bounce. Make it go away. Don't try to be a rock."

"I can see the wheels turning," almost sang Tabitha, looking delighted in the understanding dawning on her student's face. "Now, are you ready for some boring homework?"

"Huh?"

She thrust a thumb towards the exit. "You get to head out to the starting fields, but you're not allowed to attack anything. Let them come, and learn to block properly. Make deflection a second nature. Think you can do it?"

"Yeah! But…" His right hand dropped, staff swaying in the limp grip. "You didn't teach me a new spell. You said you would."

Tabitha reached out and tapped him on the nose. "One thing at a time. This is more important. Learn how to deflect and you'll take a real step towards being a better divine lord. You can do this, right? Don't let me down now."

"I won't!" he hastilly assured. "Alright. I'll practice it, but you still owe me a spell!"

"Show me you deserve it." She made a soft shooing motion. "And don't give up."